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Science from NASA: Wild Weather

What’s to Blame for Wild Weather? “La Nada”

Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder,Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never
Remember to have heard; man’s nature cannot carry
The affliction nor the fear … from Shakespeare’s Tragedy of King Lear

All this because of a flaky La Niña?

“La Niña and El Niño effect the atmosphere’s energy balance because they determine the location of warm water in the Pacific, and that in turn determines where huge clusters of tropical thunderstorms form,” explains Schneider. “These storms are the main energy source from the tropics influencing the large-scale pattern of the jet stream that flows through the US.”

In agreement with Patzert, he notes that the very strong and active jet stream across the lower US in April “may have been related to the weakening La Niña conditions observed over the tropical Pacific.”

And of course there’s this million dollar question: “Does any research point to climate change as a cause of this wild weather?”